J'Sticks Contributors

Mimi Valdés, former editor of Vibe and Latina magazines, is leaving Black Entertainment Television after only three months, a BET spokeswoman confirmed for Journal-isms on Wednesday.

Valdés is BET’s vice president for content, supervising BET.com.

In June, after Valdés was hired, BET.com was the most widely viewed Internet site catering to African Americans, according to ComScore, an Internet ratings service. But it lost half its unique visitors and slipped to third place among those sites in the September ratings, a ComScore spokeswoman said on Thursday. The site had also laid off six people.

In June, BET received 3.5 million unique visitors, compared with 2.9 million for AOL Black Voices, 2.3 million for MediaTakeOut.com and 1.7 million for Black Planet.

In September, the rankings were AOL Black Voices, 2,568,000; MediaTakeOut.com, 2,144,000; BET Networks, 1,702,000; and BlackPlanet.com, 1,695,000, according to the ComScore figures. Essence.com dropped from 968,000 to 943,000 unique visitors, and BlackAmericaWeb.com, which was not included in the June figures, had 343,000.

“Mimi Valdés will be leaving BET Networks and we wish her the best in her future endeavors,” spokeswoman Jeanine Liburd said.

A enterprise system is a tool with three essential purposes:
conversation, management, and preparing.

As a interaction device, it is used to bring in financial
investment money, secure loans, persuade personnel to use on, and support in attracting strategic company
companions. The enhancement of a extensive small business prepare displays irrespective
of whether or not a business enterprise has the opportunity to make a revenue.
It calls for a reasonable glance at almost every period of your film challenge,
in particular the distribution and subsequent income streams essential to recoup your expense.
Also, it shows that you have labored out all the difficulties of your undertaking.

As a administration tool, the business enterprise prepare assists you observe,
observe, and examine your development. The enterprise prepare is
a dwelling doc that you will modify as you development
in your project. By utilizing your small business program to establish timelines and milestones, you can gage your
development and examine your projections to true accomplishments.

As a planning resource, the business prepare guides
you by means of the a variety of phases of your organization. A
considerate system will enable identify roadblocks and road blocks so that you can steer clear of them and establish solutions.

But even a lot more importantly, in a film venture the small business prepare also serves an additional important objective you want it to bring
in traders to fund your job. No 1 is likely to invest in your undertaking unless they can see how they are heading to get
repaid and a lot more importantly, make a earnings.

“Anyone on the lookout for funding for everything must have a organization prepare, period,” claims talent supervisor Glenn Rigberg, of the Beverly Hills firm of Rigberg, Roberts,
Rugalo. “An unbiased film company approach [without cash and a tricky give to go with it] will not get actors hooked up. But a solid, powerful approach can give a filmmaker a certain diploma of credibility in the fundraising arena. That is in which it counts.”

What should go into a film company prepare? Your business strategy ought to often be very
simple and simple. Don’t squander a great deal of time establishing a
40 site document that no one will read. Preserve it to 10 to
fifteen web pages at most. Typically, each approach features the next

* The Executive Summary – a cover sheet that lists the credits of the producers,
director and talent and describes the spending plan, commence
date and other key data in short, bite-dimensions paragraphs.

* A Synopsis- A brief model of the storyline adopted by an “expense deserves” area, which breaks down all the
beneficial features of the challenge, but
does not include the ending (you want them to go through the script).

These features may be proven talent, distribution ensures, or huge possible audiences for the movie.

* Environment- A short summary to educate your reader about the field and alternatives inside the business.
You can also describe who your likely shoppers are and you can point
out a several films that resemble your venture.

* Operations- Description of how your inner operation will be structured
from the top rated down in get to deliver the venture.

Suggest what support companies, casting, gear, facilities, spots, lawful advisory
expert services, subtitling, etc. will be required to properly execute the job.
Doc any vital funds prerequisites needed for delivering your challenge.
Define resources of and phrases for funding. Reveal what financing has been sourced and how substantially is nonetheless
needed.

* Marketing and advertising- Describe your company’s tactic
to pursuing the industry to distribute your film and receive earnings.

Summarize your distribution channels and method.

* Economical Projections- Present an assessment of what it will value to create the film which addresses total resources
necessary, resources source, and balance to be financed.
Consist of a budget summary with projected higher than-the-line and below-the-line charges.
List your gross sales projections and briefly describe how you derived them.

* Monetary Statements- Prepare a funds flow statement displaying inflows and outflows of money from thirty day period to month throughout the to start with year.

Put together a equilibrium sheet reflecting the property and liabilities of the challenge.
Prepare an Profits Assertion exhibiting the revenue, expense, and profitability of the venture.

In these recessionary moments, money is tricky to arrive by.
It is really no extended sufficient to present a killer
script and a marvelous pitch. In this new unbiased
movie financial system, the folks who still
have dollars want to see recoupment projections, marketing programs, internal prices of return, and numerous
earnings streams. A thoroughly well prepared and informative
business enterprise strategy will go a prolonged way
in assisting you to receive the financing for your undertaking.

It can also be a worthwhile resource in making sure the timely and
efficient completion of your movie.

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NPR blew it by firing Juan Williams

Williams used his liberal credentials to take an issue out of the closet, something a lot of us felt but were not supposed to acknowledge. It was liberal catharsis, sort of like Bill Cosby’s comments on the self-inflicted failure of so many inner-city youth and their parents.

Allowing things to fester is not healthy. Covering your ears and walking off the stage — like Whoopi Goldberg and Joy Behar did when O’Reilly blamed 9-11 on Muslims — is not healthy.

As abhorrent as these views are to liberals, the majority of Americans relate to them. This discussion needs to take place openly and often. Otherwise it festers and blows up like it did at the so-called “Ground Zero mosque.”

NPR vs. Fox News: Juan Williams firing reveals deeper media fight

Williams is an accomplished journalist and an expert on the civil rights era. But his on-air comments had become more openly opinionated in recent years, and this was why in 2008 his job title was changed from “news correspondent” to “news analyst.” On Fox, however, he was expected to be a pundit, performing alongside such provocative figures as Bill O’Reilly. There, the format is more likely to be shoot-from-the-lip.

NPR’s reaction to the current episode is likely to prolong the controversy, certainly among fans of Fox and its most successful personality, Glenn Beck.

Writes NPR ombudsman Shephard: “This latest incident with Williams centers around a collision of values: NPR’s values emphasizing fact-based, objective journalism versus the tendency in some parts of the news media, notably Fox News, to promote only one side of the ideological spectrum.” [SOURCE]

A little birdie is told J’Sticks that Amy DuBois Barnett (formerly of Honey & Teen People magazines) is now the EIC of magazine. For months now EBONY has been trying to make the right moves to stay alive in this harsh publishing market. There was the announcement that they would be focusing more on the web (this month’s cover with Niecy Nash features a masthead that only lists digital staffs but not editorial).

“I am extremely pleased to bring Amy DuBois Barnett on as part of the new leadership team,” said President and CEO Linda Johnson Rice. “She brings with her a wealth of experience, a keen journalistic eye and solid editorial judgment, which will serve well to help redefine the EBONY brand within the ever-changing marketplace.”

Barnett is a Brown University graduate and also has a M.F.A degree in creative writing from Columbia University. She is the author of Get Yours: How to Have Everything You Ever Dreamed of and More, an NAACP Image Award-nominated book for Black women.

“EBONY has always represented the best of African-African achievement, society and culture, and I couldn’t be more honored to be at the helm as we enhance this icon for the 21st century,” said Barnett. “I’m excited to bring the EBONY brand to multiple media platforms and to engage new audiences who will surely be moved by its resonant, provocative and authoritative perspective on today’s African-American experience.” The new appointment will replace Harriette Cole as acting Editor-in-Chief and Creative Director.

With many outlets slashing pay scales, the well-written story is in danger of becoming scarce. The hustle is just beginning for new and seasoned freelancers.

By James Rainey

The list of freelance writing gigs on Craigslist goes on and on.

Trails.com will pay $15 for articles about the outdoors. Livestrong.com wants 500-word pieces on health for $30, or less. In this mix, the 16 cents a word offered by Green Business Quarterly ends up sounding almost bounteous, amounting to more than $100 per submission.

Other publishers pitch the grand opportunities they provide to “extend your personal brand” or to “showcase your work, influence others.” That means working for nothing, just like the sailing magazine that offers its next editor-writer not a single doubloon but, instead, the opportunity to “participate in regattas all over the country.”

What’s sailing away, a decade into the 21st century, is the common conception that writing is a profession — or at least a skilled craft that should come not only with psychic rewards but with something resembling a living wage.(More …)

…Tina Brown has never been one for self-doubt. A precocious magazine editor who breathed new life into the fusty Tatler (at age 25), Vanity Fair (at 30) and the venerable New Yorker (at 38), Brown’s success was notable for many things, among them the envy it inspired and her prodigious talent for self-promotion. And then came Talk, the magazine, book and entertainment venture that was supposed to secure her place in the cultural firmament, starting with the scandalously decadent launch party she threw at the foot of the Statue of Liberty in August 1999…

…For the past 15 months, she has presided over the Daily Beast, the newsmagazine-style website she created for her friend, Internet mogul Barry Diller.

The site’s growing readership suggests that she has been able to translate her trademark blend of intellectual depth and fascination with the shallows of pop culture to the Internet. But the big question looms: Can she help Diller figure out how to bring high-end advertisers to high-end consumers in a profitable way?…

Someone over at Esquire thought it’d be cool to write about Mr. Empire State. Can’t fault them there. He’s coming off a big year. But then they went and gave the writer, Lisa Taddeo, the greenlight to cover him this way:

“Jay-Z is black black. He is old-school double-dark-chocolate-chunk black. He is black the way Labatt is blue. He is not white black, Barack black, like our president. Or the kind of black that doesn’t curse and deplores the n-word, the genteel black, like Oprah. He is, arguably, the first black-black guy to cross over into Oprah-land and Bill Clintonworld without making the Oprah-sized no-look-back forward flip that means you’re selling not necessarily your soul but perhaps something fleshier, a little more external.”

To make matters worse, they highlighted the above text for dramatic affect. Before you go thinking that it’s only black people who are thinking WTF other’s have sounded off on Esquire missing the mark.

Of Color | Stylish Gifts

By SIMONE S. OLIVER

Somali fashion, do-it-yourself henna kits, children’s books that draw inspiration from the lives of Barack Obama and Sonia Sotomayor: it’s not hard to find gifts created for and by people of color this holiday season. Here are some possibilities.

This could be a case of when “keeping it real goes wrong”. Sure we all shop and knowing what to get for the holidays is key but making a separate list for people of color instead of incorporating it in the rest of the guide is a bit much…